Specks 2012

[ChrisR]

I have common sense and experience Aiko......which I'm sure you have too. I've never been to Specks. But from what I see on your link and from his online lists over the years.....it is my opinion that the plants are habitat collected and not "of farming origin". Where are these farms? I see various shapes and sizes in many different genera on those benches.The sheer size and of the caudex makes them many years old, that cannot be disputed. I've said before, if they are legally imported I would love to know how and where from. In fact I would probably be interested in investing in such a business myself if anyone reading this can tell me his suppliers. If they are legally purchased they are surely open to commercial nursery buyers as wholesalers to the trade and not secret?

If anyone can prove my opinons wrong I will eat humble pie and apologise.

[Aiko]

But from what I see on your link and from his online lists over the years.....it is my opinion that the plants are habitat collected and not "of farming origin".

As you probably can confirm from personal observation in Africa (where I have never been), there are definitely some species threatened by construction work on roads, industrial areas, housing development or mining in Africa. It is not very unlikely to see a big pile of ancient plants next to a freshly build road, as they were in the way of "progress". I don't think it is very unlikely with good contacts at city planning and knowledge of habitat locations, one can buy those "weeds" that would have rotted away very cheaply, and ship them to Europe.

If this is true for Specks, I don't know. For some species, could well be. For a wide range of species, not very likely.

I've said before, if they are legally imported I would love to know how and where from. In fact I would probably be interested in investing in such a business myself if anyone reading this can tell me his suppliers.

I would not expect this not to be public information. I don't think many business are very open about their distributors and contacts to the public, for obvious reasons.

If they are legally purchased they are surely open to commercial nursery buyers as wholesalers to the trade and not secret?

They do sell to wholesale sellers. Today was only the second day they were open to private sellers. Only half a day, so that is not much if you are depending on retail sellers only (their auction site must be more profitable...). But they were open for the entire week to wholesale sellers. I had a chat with one of the owners, and they sold plants of a certain species by the tray, I understood. Based on empty spaces in trays with a lot of pots of the same species, it was clear many were picked out on large scale.

[ChrisR]

I'm wasting my time......

[Tina]

Hi Aiko & chris

Thanks it's somewhere I still want to go .

I do know that Ernst has to have a licence & appropriate certificates before he can import these plants, I have heard that he has contacts that cultivate plants for him. Germany has stricter import regulations than England.

Wha'ts the difference between his ex habitat OR farmed plants & a new species that is discovered then comes into cultivation, I don't notice any native conophytum when I am walking to the shops .

[Liz M]

I am going on the Scottish trip, this week and I am sure we will be going to Specks. I'll take a few photos and have a good look round for something.

[ChrisR]

I think I'm about to “do a DaveW”, so I apologise in advance......

Seriously.....this is a difficult and emotive subject which really interests me. Considering the Forum heading includes “conserve” I find it strange that no one else has contributed an opinion on it and I seem to be a lone voice.... apart from Tina & Aiko who are obviously big fans of Exotica - which I've no problem with – it looks an amazing place and he obviously has some interesting seed & cutting raised plants as well as mature imported specimens.

Tina saying “I do know that Ernst has to have a licence & appropriate certificates”, is probably true – I don't know German rules. But you actually know that he has these do you? He probably has, I can't possibly say he hasn't of course. But I think that has very little to do with my issues.

I've had very nice and friendly UK Min of Ag inspectors checking my plants prior to issuing phytos for export and they hadn't a clue what they were looking at. They told me their usual checks were on potatoes, trees or flowers. They'd never seen a Conophytum or Adromishcus, so didn't know what pests or diseases to look for.....but issued certificates anyway. I would dare to suggest that the same goes for any of the African countries where they may even issue an export licence. A little cash offered here and there will obtain the necessary paperwork I'm sure. I've personally taken South African nursery purchases to the Cape Town offices to get a phyto to bring plants home and even they went through the motions, asking me what the plants were and genuinely keen to learn. When I went thorough the red channel to hand it in to the Customs officer at Heathrow, he took the forms and shrugged indifferently when I asked if he needed to see the plants. Do you think an African nursery would not be able to tell (or bribe) any official, for example, that a batch of wild plants brought in by locals were actually grown from seed there?

Maybe I'm the only one not reluctant to express an opinion here, because most people realise that we are all growing plants either directly from or derived from ex habitat material that shall we say, was obtained by dubious means? We would all have very sparsely filled greenhouse if we weren't able to grow this stuff.

To be honest I suspect like many other people, every single plant I'm growing is in that category and there are many on here who would secretly admit the the same, be they growing cacti or other succulents.

But most of our plants (and I know mine for sure) are grown from seed or cuttings which is conserving not just digging up and selling on lots of large, old plants. This was the Deherdt and Jumanery of old and shouldn't be happening now we know better. Any plants I sell or pass on to friends have invariably taken years to grow from seed, leaves or cuttings, even if they came originally without paperwork.

How many collectors will go to Exotica and buy two or more specimens of caudiciform Euphorbia ambovombensis, Pelargonium alternans, Sarcocaulon herrei or Othonna euphorbioides, for example, in order to have two clones to hopefully produce seeds? I would suggest none. Every buyer will purchase but one plant of each to stick in a pot for their personal gratification and more than likely, sooner or later kill......where is the "conserve" and "propagate" in that?

After saying all that, to me it simply comes down to this. If a large & mature plant on a sales bench or website photo looks like it came from habitat, it probably did.......no matter how much you try to convince yourself it didn't or that it must be legal because of who is selling it. Does it matter if it is? In my opinion it's just not moral.

I'd love to hear other views on this, but don't know if anyone else is willing to get involved?

[Aiko]

After saying all that, to me it simply comes down to this. If a large & mature plant on a sales bench or website photo looks like it came from habitat, it probably did.......

You might be right. But I think you are foremost jumping the gun. I am thinking of alternative ways in how they might do their business, alternatives which make (in my opinion) perfectly sense, instead of collecting from habitat as you have concluded for yourself to be the most likely option. Regarding this subject you are on the safe side with your conclusion, which is not unreasonable. I suspect there is more to think about where these plants actually came from.

But I don't know. Nor can I know for sure.
Stories about Specks I hear are either the same as you (they must have been habitat collected) or are about nurseries in Africa.

You and me both are not able to provide much sunlight to our plants. I am sure I cannot grow many of the plants I see at Specks equally compact or large, even though my plants get light from dusk to dawn. But in a country like Spain, I think this is a whole different story and plants can look more "like habitat". I know there are lots of succulent nurseries in the Canary islands (Spanish territory, so easy to import to other EU countries). Especially many of the Dutch nurseries (Ubink and Van der Linden spring to mind). I can recall some large Cyphostemma's on a picture on a farm on one of the Canary island where Van der Linden does some of its business. You would not believe how big some of those were (thick trunks as wide as a football, one meter high). Why could plants at Specks not have been grown there?

It just would seem to be unlikely a company that runs on habitat collected plants in such high quantities can do business like this for over 20 (?) years. Something is just bound to go wrong at some time if you don't change your way of business. As two owners of a plant selling company in Spain had noticed last year, when they were caught collecting wild plants. But that was of suitcase sized quantities, if I remember well enough.

How Specks did they business in their early years, before the had set up a (selling or acquiring) network and before they gained capital to invest to the size they are at now, is possibly a more dodgy story.

I'd love to hear other views on this, but don't know if anyone else is willing to get involved?

I would not mind hearing some interesting insights on this topic from others too.

[Nick_G]

The question isn't whether nurseries specialising in African succulents sell legally or illegally collected habitat plants, of course they do, it would be very naive to think otherwise, but whether this is right or wrong and that is a matter for your own conscience to decide. I am becoming less opposed to this as I get older, I don't know why.

If these nurseries have nothing to hide it would be nice if they would clearly state in their catalogues if the plants they are selling are nursery/farm raised or plants taken from habitat. That way we could decide with a clear conscience whether to buy or not.

[IainS]

I would definitely support what ChrisR is saying. (However, I have never been to Specks and do not know where their plants originate from. The photos do include wild-collected plants.)

Unlike probably everyone else (or almost everyone else) on this forum, the reason we have succulents/cacti in our greenhouse is directly tied in with our conservation work. Our collection is one of many tools to help prepare team members before working at our nature reserves in South Africa, as well as further inspire them as part of on-going training.

Our biggest reserve is in the succulent Karoo and we are conserving 30,700 acres - a size bigger than some national parks.

I have worked in South Africa for 24 years, spending an average of three months each year in the country. I am familiar with the majority of nurseries in South Africa (wholesale as well as retail) that specialise in growing succulents - not least because I am a wholesale nurseryman in the UK. I have never seen any production within South Africa that would suggest they supply Specks.

There is a serious problem of collectors stripping plants from the veld in South Africa. I have personally witnessed this (and stepped in). It adds up over the years. Thankfully, the Western Cape authorities are getting serious about anyone caught illegally collecting. There is a 2015 thread on this topic.

I fully agree with DaveW that governments are hypocritical. Damage to habitat is frequently caused by other activities other than collectors, such as road expansion projects, with no seeming concern about what plants are being destroyed. But two wrongs don't make a right.

To hopefully prevent any misunderstanding, I am delighted that the BCSS exists. But I think the words "cultivate" and "propagate" should be placed ahead of "conserve". Why? Because this more accurately represents the actual interests of most members. Yes, "conserve" can be widely interpreted. But there is clearly an issue of "lip service" - as this thread demonstrates.

I could say much, much more on this important subject. But my intention here is to support what ChrisR has said above. He is experienced and respected. So isn't this where the word "educate" should come in? Views need to be challenged. Debate should happen. Facts provide a better foundation, as different from speculation. Changing minds is a very difficult task, but there can be no doubt whatsoever that it needs to be done. Ignorance, contradiction, and hypocrisy make human life less than it could be.

[Al Laius]

I agree with Chris and think that some of the plants pictured in that link certainly looked as if they had allegedly come from habitat.

This much I know - often large quantities of succulent plants are stripped from habitat and are then held at a local nursery for a while. They then in effect become nursery stock. I'm sure that Mr. Specks has all the required paperwork to import plants legally. There was a period a few years ago when various sized specimens (including some mature plants) were being offered on his auction site, and it was alleged that these plants were not so very long ago in the ground in habitat. This particularly applies to Tanzania.

The same thing occurs in Madagascar and no doubt other African counties too, though as Ian points out, is more difficult to do in South Africa itself. Of course as Aiko states, and I have seen them with my own eyes, many succulents are grown in Tenerife and legally shipped to other European countries for resale.

Education and conservation go hand in hand and the two should be inseparable.

Al